A league source said Golden State, Minnesota and Cleveland have shown interest in acquiring Suns power forward Amar’e Stoudemire.

Major hang-ups in a possible deal are the Suns’ need to get good value in return and the other team’s need to feel secure in knowing it has a chance to keep Stoudemire, who can opt out of his contract this summer.

Stoudemire has said he wants to play for a title contender but prefers to stay with the Suns, who met with his agent Thursday.

Stoudemire in Cleveland would be the most compelling case, but a pairing with Shaquille O’Neal has already failed spectacularly. And I don’t trust Mike Brown to figure out how to make the two co-exist on the court.
According to Yahoo!, the number of teams blowing up Steve Kerr’s cell phone is even bigger: Chicago, Miami, Philly and New Jersey have all reportedly expressed interest in the star forward.

None of the reports seem to suggest that a deal is anywhere close to being done, and there’s a belief that Stoudemire would like to stay in Phoenix. But, where’s there’s smoke, there’s usually a bit of fire.